Green Day – American Idiot

By now everyone in the punk community has heard of Green Day‘s new album, American Idiot, and most of those have already bought the album. The self-proclaimed “punk-rock opera” is definitely not like any Green Day album before hand; but it’s still a damn good CD. With most Green Day CDs in the past, you could take it out, pop-it in your CD player, press random and let it fly. Each song was strong enough to be a single and keep you entertained. There was no order it had to be in, you could just listen to each song and they stood out. Now enters American Idiot. And, excluding a few tracks on the CD, its not full of songs you can just give a spin. It is a complete album. Telling a story of a character during all his trials and tribulations of life leading up to his suicide. And as I said before, it’s a damn good CD.

The album opens up with the CD-titled track, American Idiot, which has been tearing up the charts. A quick, catchy, politically-angst power punk song that kicks the album into high gear right away. Next up is the five part Jesus Of Suburbia, which introduces the character of the punk rock opera. The nine minute, eight second track’s five separate sections each has their specific sound, making them feel like separate songs but keeping it flow easily. But that’s only one of the many differences in this album compared to the band’s previous catalogues. They have slower songs like Wake Me Up When September Ends, Give Me Novocain, and Boulevard Of Broken Dreams. But then contrasting them are rip-roaring fast ones like American Idiot, St. Jimmy, and She’s A Rebel. They even have a very sing along song with Are We The Waiting; where you can’t help but chant along with Billie Joe has he sings “Are We, We Are The Waiting” over and over again.

This “punk rock album” is a great album. But you can’t chop it up and listen to it track by track like you used to be able to do with Green Day‘s CD. It is an “album”. A solid 57 minutes of punk rock portraying the stories of “Jesus Of Suburbia” and “St. Jimmy”. This will be in the top ten lists of many reviewers at the end of this year.